[GCW]

Surely you should be using this strike time to write your blog?

There is no blog.

[IanP]

You are assuming I earn 80k- I don't earn anywhere near that, which is why the figures seem odd. I'm a salaried GP, so my full time equivalent wage is 63k, although at present I'm part time.

Very open of you to include such details.  Worth noting that for most people 63k is far enough away to seem pretty close to 80k.

For context I don't earn quite that much but aren't that far off - I also accept that living in the North West that leaves me pretty comfortably off compared to most people (see earlier post, 61k puts you in top 5% countrywide).

[GCW]

I see no point in being all cloak and dagger. I'm not ashamed of my salary, I have worked hard to get here, and still work hard now.

[saltbeef]

http://download.thelancet.com/flatcontentassets/pdfs/S0140673612609957.pdf

[fatkid2000]

As a GP partner is a large city/urban practice I think successive governments a working to bring the NHS down. Then the profession takes the blame. The problem is the country can't afford a free at the point of delivery open access health care system. The system has been abused and with our ageing population it's unsustainable.

Over the past 5 years the medical profession has been hit with one thing after another. Some of these topics are on here:

Modernising medical careers.
Revalidation
CQC registration
Major efficiency savings - seeing 20% of old secondary care now done in primary care - with no funding.
Btw - the conservatives stated there would be no funding NHS cuts - this is utter bollocks.
On top of 8/9 surgeries a week I have to start work at 6 am twice a week to keep on top of all the shit the doh wants and I doubt it makes any difference to the punters who come through my door.

The profession has had enough - the NHS is slowly disappearing and I doubt it will still be there in 10 years. I'll probably be financially better off but the NHS is a fantastic thing which delivers health care for all - so the general public won't.

As GCW states the profession provides £2 billion a year to the government. When I qualified I earnt about £20k for working 90 + hours / week. We did this as we cared for our patients, and thought if we did our 30 years we at least got a good pension. Now the goal posts have moved and that's twice in four years.

[fatkid2000]

The BMA should have been far more vocal on opposition to the health bill and the privatisation of the NHS.

For info my practice has been open as normal.

[slackline]

The BMA should have been far more vocal on opposition to the health bill and the privatisation of the NHS.

 

[andy_e]

Surely you should be using this strike time to write your blog?

There is no blog.

What happened to it?

[ShortRound]

I've scanned the previous posts so apologies if this has been mentioned already but as far as I'm aware the doctors' pension scheme was reformed a few years ago to ensure it is sustainable and these increased contributions do not go into the actual pension pot, they go direct to the treasury.

So all the divide and rule/race to the bottom bullshit that the conservatives are spouting by saying "look at all the MONEY they get, you don't get that money do you?" Is masking the fact that this is simply a way to grab more money for the treasury (to fund Gove's bibles or other bollocks).

[Probes]

Surely you should be using this strike time to write your blog?

There is no blog.

What happened to it?

   RIP   

[slackline]

Surely you should be using this strike time to write your blog?

There is no blog.

What happened to it?

It became redundant now that it rains every single fucking day

[tomtom]

As a GP partner is a large city/urban practice I think successive governments a working to bring the NHS down. Then the profession takes the blame. The problem is the country can't afford a free at the point of delivery open access health care system. The system has been abused and with our ageing population it's unsustainable.

Over the past 5 years the medical profession has been hit with one thing after another. Some of these topics are on here:

Modernising medical careers.
Revalidation
CQC registration
Major efficiency savings - seeing 20% of old secondary care now done in primary care - with no funding.
Btw - the conservatives stated there would be no funding NHS cuts - this is utter bollocks.
On top of 8/9 surgeries a week I have to start work at 6 am twice a week to keep on top of all the shit the doh wants and I doubt it makes any difference to the punters who come through my door.

The profession has had enough - the NHS is slowly disappearing and I doubt it will still be there in 10 years. I'll probably be financially better off but the NHS is a fantastic thing which delivers health care for all - so the general public won't.

As GCW states the profession provides £2 billion a year to the government. When I qualified I earnt about £20k for working 90 + hours / week. We did this as we cared for our patients, and thought if we did our 30 years we at least got a good pension. Now the goal posts have moved and that's twice in four years.

Thats a really good post (amongst other good ones here too). Sadly it confirms what I (and I suspect a few of us) were thinking.. waddage.

[GCW]

Surely you should be using this strike time to write your blog?

There is no blog.

What happened to it?

It became redundant now that it rains every single fucking day

I don't want to go off topic here. I deleted it as it started to feel a little narcissistic.

[Offwidth]

did you make the right decision? 



You've got more direct experience than me but these bankers don't appear on the guardian article linked earlier..... 

Wasn't directly avoiding it just talking about different things.  First point, in general savings aren't been stolen - .... I'm willing to hazard a guess that I'd jump at a chance to join a scheme like the doctors have even after its changes.

Decisions, decisions: I've always chased my ideals and interests over money. I may never have hacked the slog and boring memory stuff in medical training so might not have got there (a risk for anyone... all those debts and you may not even make it). Further to work I've  'wasted' (from some perspectives but not mine), for nearly a decade, the majority of my valuable free time doing free work for BMC guidebooks. I'm paid well enough as a top-of-the-career-grade standard academic but did turn down several more lucrative industrial research and consultancy type jobs, early career.

The average graduate starting salary is currently nearer £18k in my opinion. The data we get back from our Computing and Technology students (who generally do well) doesn't come close to matching the oft quoted average of £26k, which comes from a minority of students going to blue chips. Our students going to these merchant banks will be looking at £30k+ on placement and with demonstated success (not all of them) will get another £10K+ as graduates.

Savings are stolen: the protections attached to the 'old' fixed bits of the pensions are reduced (important for those mid-career, because how many people seriously think all these workers will make it to 68 in continuous service in the public sector, all of whom are at this point 13 years or more off the current retirement age), and, more importantly, RPI linkage moved to CPI linkage taking pension growth down on average 1% a year for everyone.

I know theses pensions are more than affordable now as I'm privy to independant actuarial data on my TPS scheme and also as I face those those two laughable assumptions in the government counter-arguments (that starting 2 years ago pay would increase year on year by CPI +1 and that we would nearly all all stay working to 68 in the scheme; when I'd be amazed if 25% of us make it, down to things like privatisation, performance issues, or the sane view of taking an actuarial hit to get out early and live longer).

You say how good these schemes are, even after the changes compared to non-public sector schemes but this just shows how poorly the private pension sector performs in the UK (its not all the pension managers' fault... governments haven't helped either). However, its bizarre logic to break something that works because alternatives available elsewhere perform less well.. how about doing the opposite instead?. In the end we all pick up the tab on our future taxes for people left without proper pension arrangements. I've already made the point that private sector pension reform is desperately needed (already started in many European countries).

[GCW]

Ah, another unilateral volte face and another nail in the coffin for primary care as we know it.  I wonder where all my subscription money goes